The launch of Windows 7 is only days
away and Microsoft has big hopes for the new OS. Many computer makers
are also hoping that the new OS will spur consumers and businesses to
buy new machines. Despite the hopes of computer makers and Microsoft,
Steve Ballmer is playing
down the roll of Windows 7 in improving PC sales.

In the
corporate world, the vast majority of firms never upgraded to Vista.
One of the reasons few corporations upgraded to Vista was that at the
time it launched only 50% of the computers in use were able to run
the OS and meet Vista's minimum requirements.

Microsoft will
be glad to hear that 65%
of current PCs in the corporate world are able to run Windows 7
in its optimal configuration. A mere 6% of computers could run Vista
in it optimal configuration when it launched. Those percentages were
compiled by IT asset management company Softchoice. The firm goes on
to say that 88% of corporate computers can run Windows 7 at minimum
specifications.

Softchoice Services Development Manager Dean
Williams wrote in a research note, "Since so few organizations
made the switch to Vista, over 90 percent of PCs have remained on
Windows XP—an operating system about to celebrate its 10th
birthday—while close to 5 percent are running operating systems
that Microsoft no longer supports. Given the added risks and costs of
maintaining aging infrastructure, organizations would be well advised
to begin planning their move to more current technology. The fact
that so many organizations are already entitled to do so through
Microsoft's Software Assurance should remove cost as a potential
barrier."

Softchoice found in a survey of 450,000
corporate PCs more than nine out of ten have Windows XP installed.
Nearly one in ten have a combination of Windows 2000 and Windows NT 4
-- Vista was only found on 3% of computers.

"We've seen a
sea change compared to the landscape in which Vista was introduced,"
Williams said. "Organizations have some work to do to shore up a
small percentage of their fleet, but the natural PC refresh cycle has
more or less eliminated system requirements as a potential stumbling
block to deploying Windows 7. The migration question is now about
understanding the benefits of switching as well as implementing a
plan to minimize any potential deployment headaches."

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Oh, I was just saying what vista fan boys yabber about. "its just because your computer is weak" "Memory is cheap".

They don't seem to get, the first year of vista's release - 2GB of RAM was about $100~200... and that IS NOT enough. 4 years ago, an AMD x2 3800 was about $500 ($200 when vista was released) - but todays $60 CPUs would blow it away and 4GB of RAM is $30~50 (DDR2).

These fanboys would yell "LIAR!", "You don't know what you talking about!", etc. Sure, they blew $1000+ on their computer, who cares.

Most people and CORP. users don't need/use gaming systems. They just need something powerful enough to ENTER DATA, browse the web and work reliable, constantly and quickly.Which is something vista failed in every aspect.

So all of the sudden, companies are supposed to upgrade hundreds, if not thousands of PCs for an OS upgrade that doesn't really change/improve productivity? If anything, it slows things down so much, they need whole new computers? As we see by the numbers, they didn't. Upgrading EACH PC with just memory alone in 2007 would have been $200,000 for 1000 PCs, RAM+labor only + $100,000 for the OS itself (not including labor... but lets figure $50 x 5hrs per PC = $250 x 1000 systems = $250,000.

End costs: $550,000 to upgrade 1000 PCs and for what? email, data entry and word processing? When XP was working just fine as is!

In very early 2007, I replaced 10PCs in one small business from old P3/Win98 boxes. To have made them "Vista" usable would have added $3000 in hardware alone and NOT compatible with some of their software.

Techs on a various sites (including such like Anandtech /Daily ) have talked about the memory/performance issues. Each additional running program would drag the system down more and more. Win7 performance would remain a line on the graph.

Just tonight, here is what I did:I had my Thinkpad with Win7 over to a friends place. He's never seen Win7. He has Vista a IdeaPad notebook. He is *used* to vista but his comments "I try not to use it as much as possible"... he doesn't want to fool with it.

I booted up for him, and let him play with it... in which he said "looks mostly and feels like vista". I showed him the improvement in usage, and he LIKE those features (quick launch, preview functions, etc). Then I ran a lot of apps.Word, Excel, 2 videos (moving), 3 browser windows with 1-2 tabs, Adobe Reader, MP3 music playing, photo view, 1-2 other programs and TaskManager... which reported I still had about 110mb free.

My "slow" notebook was still faster than his newer Vista notebook.

That is truth.

For corporate companies, they have been buying new PCs over the year or so with 2+GB RAM and dual core CPUs. But have installed XP on them (meanwhile, MS counted them as Vista sales, ugh). I know, I have done them myself. I've NEVER setup a corp. client with Vista.

But Windows7 is on peoples plans. I'm actually getting Win7 business already... just waiting.